The Raiders’ latest QB surprise event and how to handle it: Palmer to Flynn to Pryor to McGloin…

* 1:29 p.m. update: Two bits of news. First, Dennis Allen just named Matt McGloin the starting QB for Sunday’s game vs. Tennessee, which is obviously not a surprise.

And the other: Rookie CB D.J. Hayden was placed on the injured reserve list and is out for the year after undergoing sports hernia surgery. Not a great debut season for the No. 1 pick, basically a complete wash-out. I remember when some Raiders fans got a bit mad at me in July when I reported that there was skepticism among NFL execs about that pick way back then. Too bad we changed systems and the rage-comments weren’t saved. Oh well.

-Presuming that coach Dennis Allen and his staff want to see more of Matt McGloin as the Raiders’ starter, and I would think they do very much, the Raiders have yet another interesting situation to deal with at that position.

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Remember, they finished last season with Carson Palmer set (sort of) as their starter–established veteran, with time left on his contract, who had cost multiple valuable picks to get him only a year earlier.

Since then…

-Last April, Palmer got himself traded to Arizona;

-The Raiders acquired Matt Flynn from Seattle to be the new starter (concurrent to the Palmer trade talks);

-The Raiders drafted Tyler Wilson in the fourth round to be a potential QB of the future;

-Wilson was not good in training camp and was cut, then re-signed to the practice squad when no other team picked him up;

-Flynn flamed out in the preseason and then again in one start during the regular season;

-Terrelle Pryor, the new No. 2 QB heading into camp (replacing zero-future 2012 Raiders’ back-up Matt Leinart), theoretically battling for that spot with Wilson, won the starting job in preseason (thanks to Flynn’s sore arm and lousy play) and performed well for several weeks;

-Pryor hurt his knee, played poorly for a few weeks, then was held out of last week’s game;

-McGloin, who came into camp as at best the No. 4 option as an undrafted rookie, snapped off 3 TD passes and 0 INTs in the Raiders’ victory in Houston.

Basically, from Palmer/Leinart/Pryor to McGloin/Pryor since last April, all mostly by accident.

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That’s a long ways to go in just 7 months at the game’s most important position, but hey, if the Raiders have ended up with a line on two potential long-term QBs, it’s not a terrible situation.

I’m not sure either Pryor or McGloin are for-sure NFL starting QBs, and neither of them were exactly sought-after by the Raiders or anybody else. Pryor was inherited by this regime and McGloin was picked up as an afterthought.

But they’re both young, they both really seem to want to be on the Raiders (while Palmer was old and unhappy and Flynn was not young and got to be very unhappy), and they both are interesting players, in very different ways.

So, what do they do now with McGloin and Pryor? It will take some diplomacy by Allen, and some patience with the two and by the two, but I think this is an entirely workable situation.

This morning, the Chronicle’s Vic Tafur wrote that it’s clear McGloin will get the start Sunday, and I agree with this.

There are some similarities in timing and circumstance to last November, when Alex Smith suffered a concussion, Colin Kaepernick jumped in and blew up the Chicago Bears and that was the end of Smith’s 49ers career, essentially.

But that all happened because Kaepernick kept playing tremendously (in THAT season), and we shall see if McGloin can keep that up this season.

This is the way it goes for QBs–you’re the guy until you aren’t the guy, and that occurs when another guy shows that he can do better.

Flynn was so obviously the wrong guy that he opened the door for Pryor, who gave the franchise an energy boost in the first few weeks of the season.

Then Pryor’s injury and performance opened the door for McGloin.

And if Pryor is smart about this, he’ll know the door could open again, even if McGloin seems like the favored candidate right now.

It’s up to Allen–if indeed the Raiders are going to stay with McGloin–to do what he can to make sure Pryor doesn’t feel disrespected or shoved low, because 1) the Raiders might need Pryor and 2) Pryor tried to play through an injury, and while that wasn’t wise for himself or the team, it also was a sign of a competitor.

Also, Allen has to know that owner Mark Davis has always liked Pryor (last draft pick of his father) and indeed it was Davis who
reportedly insisted that Pryor get his start at the end of last season.

This is still a situation in flux, and that’s not a terrible thing. You want choices. You don’t want them to involve guys like Leinart or Kyle Boller, you want interesting options like Pryor or McGloin.

The way to play this, probably, is for Allen and his staff to tell Pryor that he can’t give his best shot if he’s not 100%, and suggest to Pryor that, well, maybe he won’t be declared 100% healthy until the Raiders get a full look at McGloin for a few weeks.

The Raiders don’t want Pryor to feel unsupported and lost, but they also should be curious to see if he’ll battle through this or if he’ll have any inclination to feel sorry for himself and cut and run.

The Raiders also don’t want to hand the job over to McGloin based on one game, but they also want to leave the possibility open–and keep the job open–that McGloin really is close to that good.

The Raiders don’t necessarily want McGloin and Pryor thinking the entire finish of the season is a throw-for-throw, meeting-for-meeting competition between the two young QBs… but that entire process wouldn’t necessarily be a terrible thing, either.

Who rises to the top, play to play to play?

The Raiders don’t want to head into 2014 putting the franchise (and Allen and McKenzie’s jobs) on the shoulders of an undrafted, unrecruited rookie, but they also have to ride the best thing they have going, and right now that’s McGloin.

And if McGloin or Pryor prove, at most, that they’re solid NFL back-ups, the Raiders have that first-round pick they can use on their true QB of the future.

Until something else changes everything, which has already happened a few times for the Raiders QB situation.

Hayden finishes this campaign with an INT and some spotty coverage. Also dropped two INT’s. Out of his class how many INT’s do the other DB’s drafted have? I have no problem with this. This injury is totally unrelated to his heart dealio. Shut him down and get him right for next year. McGloin has a Kap like chance to make TP2 a back up again. But I’ll tell you what… I like the two QB options the Raiders have going forward. This next draft and offseason is very important. They need to add some depth and locate some LB’s to group with Burris and Moore.